Proceeding Quietly Toward the Exit

E.J. Dionne notes that quite a few Republicans are beginning to distance themselves from the stay-the-course mantra in Iraq.

August 2006 will be remembered as a watershed in the politics of Iraq. It is the month in which a majority of Americans told pollsters that the struggle for Iraq was not connected to the larger war on terrorism. They thus renounced a proposition the administration has pushed relentlessly since it began making the case four years ago to invade Iraq.

That poll finding, from a New York Times-CBS News survey, came to life on the campaign trail when Rep. Chris Shays (R-Conn.), one of the most articulate supporters of the war, announced last Thursday that he favored a time frame for withdrawing troops.

[...]

Nearly as significant as the new support for troop withdrawals is the effort of many Republicans to criticize President Bush without taking a firm stand on when the troops should come home.

Rep. Mike Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.), facing a challenge from Democrat Patrick Murphy, an Iraq war veteran, took a page from former president Bill Clinton's playbook by triangulating between Murphy and the president. A Fitzpatrick mailing sent earlier this month said that Fitzpatrick favored a "better, smarter plan in Iraq" that "says NO to both extremes: No to President Bush's 'stay the course' strategy . . . and no to Patrick Murphy's 'cut and run' approach."

Notice: A Republican is suggesting that Bush's Iraq policy is extreme. That would not have happened in 2004.

In doing so, these Republicans run the risk of incurring the wrath of Rove, but I'm guessing that when it's your job on the line and Bush is a lame duck, Karl Rove and his threats of revenge don't carry a whole lot of weight, especially when it's clear that the majority of Americans are finally snapping to the fact that they got bamboozled into the war in the first place.

By the way, it's interesting to note that none of these Republicans are offering a concise plan for getting us out of Iraq, which has been the GOP's biggest PR bludgeon against the Democrats. This in spite of the fact that since it was the Bushies who got us into the war in the first place, it shouldn't be the Democrats' responsibility to get us out -- unless they're counting on the next president to be a Democrat.